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Sunday, December 13, 2009

World leaders in Copenhagen are making progress, discussing far reaching cutbacks that are necessary to save the globe. The check list is tough, but many people think it needs to be done, even if the possible tends to the impossible.

For starters, the list of delegates and officials has been trimmed from an initial one million to a mere 15,000. It means that some people will be forced to write notes to inform others that couldn't make the trip exactly what other cutbacks have been decided.Taking those notes are 5,000 journalists, another small number reflecting the need to minimise air travel and pointless burning of carbon resources. Some of those journalists are from the print media, who will cut down entire forests to let the world know just how much energy the Copenhagen conference will save by broadcasting much the same information across the carbon dioxide rich air waves.

Then there's the world leaders. At least 98 of them plus world leader minders, who have to navigate their leader past the 5,000 journalists that may misreport something said at the wrong moment. "Think of the trees" they tell their leaders: Platitudes and promises use less reporting space and have a smaller impact on the environment than long winded Climate Deniers, who feel obliged to spout endless amounts of competing research to the point that our natural resources would surely be depleted for merely reporting on them. So we'll shut them up.

Then there's the World Leaders. Not the political ones, the real ones: DiCaprio, Hannah, Charles (first name Prince) and of course Desmond Tutu is there to Tut-Tut.

The restraint doesn't just stop there though. Copenhagen has cut back to a mere 1,200 limousines to ferry important people from the airport to the hotel. The hotel to the Conference Centre, the Conference Centre back to the Hotel and the Hotel over to the little Chinese Takeaway just outside of Lyons that Pauchari recommended over caviar and champagne just a while ago.

Given that there have never actually been 1,200 limousines in Copenhagen before, many of them have been driven in from across country, but in a carbon friendly way I'm sure. Like, they let any of the 5 electric taxis at the conference pass them whenever they stop to refuel. However, in the interests of the environment the number of limousines have been capped at 1,200 and buses used for any extra trips required. This has gone down better than hoped, with world leaders accepting the substitutes with good grace.

Said Al Gore: "It was great. I've always wanted to try one of these bus things anyway. It's like a big stretch limo really, and I got a real buzz being the only one in it. Some of the other world leaders are slumming it though, and I heard they were cramming in two or three people per bus. It's totally native, and shows we can tighten our belts and do our bit." Al Gore took the helicopter on the second day, but promised to offset the pollution by investing in a carbon neutral program.

Meanwhile, UNIPCC officials are very annoyed with the ClimateGate scandal. They claim the ClimateGate scandal was a carefully timed announcement that was designed to blow the Climate change conference out of the water. It of course therefore detracted from the carefully timed statement from the EPA announcing that C02 was a dangerous pollutant:

In a politically timed announcement, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson will announce her agency's final ruling that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases endanger public health and are eligible to be regulated under the Clean Air Act.

Her announcement comes on the opening day of the long-awaited U.N. climate summit in Copenhagen, Denmark,

Isn't it good our world leaders have our best interests at heart and leading by example? I'm looking on with interest to see what comes out of Copenhagen this week.